Monday, May 5, 2014

Trails come
so that our faith can be battle tested. So that we are humbled and desperate
for God’s truth to complete us by studying and obeying His life giving word. Trails
come so that Christ is my everything; so that I can learn to rely on Christ’s
power and let go of who I am and what I can do, which is an allusion because I
am powerless to do anything without Christ’s redeeming love, forgiveness, grace
and mercy! Trails come so that we may believe. So that we run to Jesus, run
expectantly and confidently that the Lord of Lords will and does work anything
for His good! Trails come so that we can react from God’s truth and not from
our own feelings which are fleeting, often fueled by lies and can feed the
flesh more than the Spirit. Lysa TerKeurst writes, “Feelings are indicators not
dictators.” If we are clinging to God’s truth trails help us to overcome
anything in God’s strength, power, grace and love.

At
the end of week 4, “Living So That” author Wendy Blight changed us\called us to
action to commit to taking the first steps in obedience regarding the chapter
we have just completed and suggested we journal and write a prayer. My step is
sharing my calling and why and how God equipped me for it. It has been less
than a month since I heard God calling me to a specific ministry. He has been
lovingly pushing me to embrace writing again for years but fear kept me from
embracing my gift. Instead I journaled occasionally and hoped that writing
Bible study curriculum for my small groups would be just enough to keep the
Holy Spirit from motivating me to open my heart and share the mess that was my
life and rejoice that I have been redeemed and that mess is now a message. At
the beginning of “Living So That” I asked my Facebook study group to pray for
me and keep me accountable because I knew God wanted me to start a blog, He
called me last summer to do just that but after only one entry a major,
heartbreaking trail hit and I huffed and puffed and instead of healing through
God’s calling I allowed myself to fall into a deep pit of darkness not
believing I was ever meant to get my message out, I basically pulled a Moses
and told God He had called the wrong girl because I was not capable. I am not
capable but God is. While I do everything I can to live a life of blind faith
and absolute obedience to my Lord and Savior and try to shine Jesus, joy and
peace despite my terminal lung condition I had chosen to build a wall around my
writing and even though Jesus could have come barging in He waited patiently
for me to smash through, step over the rubble of self-doubt, fear and past hurt
and run into His arms. My calling is to reach women who don’t know how loved
and precious they are in the eyes of Jesus. Woman who know Jesus but have
chosen a path of rebellion or chosen to stay trapped inside a spiral of guilt
and shame; woman who have only know self-hatred, self-doubt and loathing and
mostly to reach young girls who have been burdened by their own mother’s lack
of self-confidence and fears. I grew up being told I wasn’t good enough, I was
to different and strange and the only love I ever had from extended family,
from people I craved love and attention from the most only came when I served
them, only came if I shut myself off and lived for them. I was born to a Father
who literally chose booze and drugs over time with me, a Father who never
accepted my baby brother for the gift he was because of his mental and motor
handicaps. When Jesus entered my heart and life I knew unconditional love for
the first time in my life and all of the negative labels and conditional love I
had experienced growing up stopped being the toxic anchor weighing me down and
having me count myself out. I was saved January 18, 2009 around 12:25 pm and
twelve short hours later I was rushed to the emergency room as the first signs
of my terminal lung condition roared their ugly head. That trail came so I
could experience God in a way I don’t think that broken and bruised girl I had
been ever could have. God allowed me to be stripped of myself so I could be
filled with Him. The enemy knew what God had always known that I was formed in
my mother’s womb, considered by the world as a vulgar mistake that threatened
the life my family of origin had built for themselves to bring Glory, Honor and
Praise to by Abba Father. I thank God every day because being told I was dying
a slow, agonizing death at the age of 28 gave me more peace and freedom than
the first 28 years of living every did!

My Prayer: Father
God thank you for this amazing week I have had with strong lung function and
being pain free. You have blessed me by getting me up and out of the house to live
this life you have for me. Thank you for blessing me with five amazing kids in
my life that fill me with joy and allow me to experience their beautiful lives
that are filled with You. I feel like that it is a second chance to experience
Family the way you intended. Help me Jesus to keep my eyes on You, to keep me
Eternity and Kingdom focused and to only speak Your life giving, powerful word
of Truth into woman’s hearts. Holy Spirit I need You to help me to stay true,
to nudge me when I may feel more like saving than I do equipping. Thank you
Father that in these five in half years I have never lost my fire for you, that
my passion and excitement for Your work in my life and our walk together has
remained despite the trails. I praise and pray for all of these things in your
mighty sons name, Christ Jesus. AMEN!

“God of all healing counsel! He comes
alongside us when we go through hard times, and before you know it, he brings
us alongside someone else who is going through hard times so that we can be
there for that person just as God was there for us.” 2 Corinthians 1-4 MSG

Consider
it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trails of many kinds, because you
know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance. Perseverance must
finish its work so that you may be matured and complete, not lacking anything.”
James 1:2-4 NIV